Apple wants the Apple TV to be a games console. But can it be trusted?

Alex Hern
Apple would like to see its new set-top box become the next Nintendo Wii. But it’s questionable whether the company really understands gaming..

Apple’s senior vice president of internet software and services Eddy Cue introduces the new Apple TV. Its effect on the world of games remains to be seen.

• With the launch of the new Apple TV, Apple has positioned its set-top box as the heir to the Nintendo Wii, bringing accessible casual gaming into the living room with the device’s app store and motion-sensitive remote control

• The company’s all-singing, all-dancing press conferences regularly involve a quick play-through of a video game, but usually under the guise of a graphics demonstration. Hence the introduction of Vainglory, the mobile-first multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) that debuted alongside the iPhone 6, which was explicitly characterised as an example of what the company’s new Metal API could do for game developers; and Infinity Blade, announced as “Project Sword” by Epic Games alongside the introduction of Game Centre, again with the emphasis on its graphical fidelity. “Everything you see is in realtime”, Epic’s Mike Capps emphasised.

• This time, the demonstration of Warhammer 40,000: Freeblade, a third-person shooter for the iPhone, followed a similar pattern: its compatibility with the new devices’ “3D touch” was trailed heavily. But the two games we got to see running on an Apple TV were somewhat different. Crossy Road, an already hugely popular iPhone game, served notice to existing iOS developers that porting games over to the living room was expected, while the debut of Beat Sports, a new game by Rock Band developer Harmonix, emphasised that Apple wanted to work with the sort of developer who normally steers clear of the ecosystem entirely (although Harmonix has released one iOS game previously, a port of Rock Band for the iPhone, which was co-developed with EA Montreal).

• To be sure, both demos did touch on aspects of the device that Apple was keen to show off, with Crossy Road’s tight integration with the iPhone version and Beat Sports’ use of the motion-sensitive remote. But the subtext was clear: Apple thinks it can take on Nintendo for third place in the console market.

• The problem is, even while it’s parading game developers on stage, it’s still not clear if Apple actually wants to take on the console market. The inconsistency within the company when it comes to games is painful to see, and shows no sign of abating any time soon.

• The problem is that games are treated as just another type of app by the company – albeit a very profitable type. The games store, for instance, is organised in exactly the same way as the rest of the app store, with prominence given to a few select apps and then three charts of top-selling paid games, most-downloaded free games, and “top grossing games”.

• Like all charts, those tend to be vaguely self-reinforcing – and their relation to the actual highest-quality games is loose at best – but “top grossing” takes it a stage further, encouraging the sort of cash-grabbing that makes Clash of Clans, Game of War and Candy Crush Saga a perpetual top three.

Candy Crush Saga: forever at the summit of the ‘top-grossing’ chart.

• Similarly, in the newly released guidelines for Apple TV apps, the company reveals that “the maximum size of an Apple TV app is limited to 200MB”, with no persistent local storage. In other words, apps must be lean, and they must download everything they show from the cloud. That’s smart for a media player in a world with widespread broadband penetration, as it removes the risk of one app filling up the storage with downloaded movie files, leaving all the others unable to work. Streaming is the new downloading, that much is clear.

• But 200 megabytes is a paltry amount for a game. The top-tier consoles right now ship their games on Blu-ray discs, which store at least 25GB and can rise to 128GB per disc (twice the total storage of the highest-capacity Apple TV); but even last generation’s Nintendo Wii, which is perhaps a better comparator, used DVDs that hold 5GB. On my iPhone right now, I have five games installed that are over the 200MB limit.

• Some of those games might be able to stream content, hewing to the developer guidelines by the letter by downloading levels as you play. But unless Apple seriously intends to reintroduce the interminable loading screens of pre-hard-drive console gaming, it seems clear that they simply view games as an acceptable casualty of their drive for sleek TV apps.

• Perhaps the most damaging example of Apple’s failure to give games the support they need is at the very top of the company’s app store review guidelines: “If you want to criticise a religion, write a book. If you want to describe sex, write a book or a song, or create a medical App. It can get complicated, but we have decided to not allow certain kinds of content in the App Store.”

• The iPhone is the largest games store on the planet, and it’s managed by a company whose attitude to the medium is “go write a book”. That hasn’t stopped magnificent art being made for Apple’s platforms, but it has stopped some, such as Sweatshop HD, which was pulled from the app store in 2013. Of course, that game didn’t criticise a religion or describe sex, but it did satirise exploitative employment practices in manufacturing. Can’t think why Apple would have an issue with that.

• Despite my concerns, there is the chance that the Apple TV could be good for gaming. Unlike PC games, consoles have always been fairly locked down by the platform manufacturers. In a way, its “no sex, no drugs, only rock and roll” attitude is merely replicating the same approach that Nintendo has emphasised for years in its efforts to keep its games consoles family friendly. The company has onlyallowed six 18-rated games on its platforms in its history, and maintains a strict ban on any game given the US “Adults Only” rating, alongside Sony and Microsoft.

• And unlike the old consoles, there’s no need to ask permission before making a game for the Apple TV, and the company is still much less controlling over what makes it on the App Store than any of the legacy publishers.

• But its success as a games console would be handing yet more control of the medium to a company which fundamentally looks down on games and gaming. And that should concern anyone who likes to play.